


The World Breaks Everyone

by Monorail



Category: Nebula (Webcomic)
Genre: Abuse, Backstory, Gen, Grief/Mourning, Implied/Referenced Character Death, Physical Abuse, Suicidal Ideation, Survivor Guilt, Virginis does not deal with anything in a healthy manner and B suffers for it, character trying to justify abuse, the author apologizes for the overuse of italicized flashbacks, very poor ways of dealing with grief, very poor ways of dealing with survivor's guilt
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-03-13
Updated: 2016-03-13
Packaged: 2018-05-26 12:20:02
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,284
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6238531
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Monorail/pseuds/Monorail
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p><i>The world breaks everyone and afterward many are strong in the broken places. But those that will not break it kills. It kills the very good, and the very gentle, and the very brave impartially.</i><br/> </p><p>A lot of speculation about how Virginis became the person he is </p><p>(and a bit about the person he used to be).</p>
            </blockquote>





	The World Breaks Everyone

**Author's Note:**

> This is a Virginis POV backstory/character study, so there's a fair bit about the thought process of him justifying his abuse of B; if this seems like upsetting/triggering content, I'd advise against continuing to read this story.

Afterwards, Virginis tries his best to keep his mind off it, tries to lose himself in researching burial rites (most require a _body_ , not just shredded meat) and watching out for B, tries to remember the good times and not how they were at the very end. He tries, and B isn't dead yet so he must be doing something right.

...And when it gets real bad he sleeps, because when he’s asleep he’s not awake and that's as close to not existing as he's going to get. (B asked if he dreams about the void too after the time he woke up terrified and flickering, and he snapped at her to shut up because she doesn't know _a fucking thing_ about his dreams.) Still, someone has gotta keep an eye on B and that person’s him. He can deal with being tired all the time if it means keeping her safe, and lack of sleep is as good of an excuse of his bad mood anything. (He knows he doesn't physically _need_ to sleep, that there's nothing he's done that would force his body into a low energy state to rest. That he barely slept at all for millennia before, and he still wasn't perpetually exhausted the way he is now.)

He knows that if the others were there they'd tell him he's full of shit and try and pry the truth out of him and generally cause enough problems that he’d never have the time to dwell on it because he'd be trying to keep an eye on four planets at once. And that’s… That's the whole problem right there and it hurts. It _hurts_. It hurts and it keeps hurting and keeps hurting, and when he lashes out (he can admit it's a _when_ , now, not if) it's not (entirely) for the rush of being furious instead of upset, it's not (entirely) because he hates B: it's because his planets were _here_ and now they're gone.

They’re gone.

They died.

And no one but him even remembers their names and that's, that’s all he fucking has of them. Some memories and some moons he can’t touch, and B. And he cares about her (she’s his planet too, just as much as they were), but when he sees her in the corner of his eye she looks like them and when he whirls around to look at her head on (because he keeps letting himself _hope_ ) she isn’t them and she won't be and shouldn't be because she's her and not them and he shouldn't be disappointed by that and he is anyway and all he can do is hurt. B is B is B, and no matter what she'll never be the planets he lost. It _**hurts**_.

It hurts a lot, and even though sometimes he resents B for not remembering enough for the loss to mean much to her, most of the time he envies her. (Sometimes he thinks that this is all her fault, but he knows that's unfair.)

 

* * *

 

_(“Hey, Virginis?”_

_Virginis had floated over to look at whatever it was, because he was the one everyone went to when they’d had questions that needed answering and it wasn't like he had anything better to do. “What is it?” he’d asked, keeping a careful distance from whatever it was C was crouched over. Whatever it was probably wouldn’t be any easier to identify if it was burned to a crisp._

_“I found another one,” C had said, lifting it so he could see. Another dead comet, then. The same marks as the others that’d drifted in from the edge of the void: fur-like surface and skin torn loose, back legs crushed and shattered, the entire corpse frozen solid. No dirt or rock under its claws; no sign it had fought any of the things that should be hunting small comets._

_“Yep, that definitely looks like a dead one.” Virginis had agreed, shrugging. “This is why I really don't like you hanging around over here. Why don’t you head back.” He’d nodded pointedly towards the others, where A was obviously snickering as little B managed to con D into giving her yet another piggyback ride. C had paused before turning away from where the comet came, the border with the void, and Virginis had softened his voice. “There's nothing we can do for them, C. You know that.”_

_C had nodded, and passed the comet to him without protest. Virginis didn't particularly enjoy doing this, but it was either cremation or leaving them to rot and the matter to dwell in everyone's minds. Best to just get it out of the way, he figured._

_All the same... C’s expression had been too intent when they’d looked at the burning comet cradled loosely in the palm of his hand, until he closed his fist and it was gone. Almost..._

_Virginis hadn’t been sure what was more worrying to him: the thing that might or might not have been leaving them ‘gifts’, or the spark of **fascination** in their eyes, when they’d looked over at the void._

_As they went back to the others together he’d thought he’d heard them say, almost too quiet to hear, “But…_ how _did they die, Virginis?”_

“What.” _That was…not something he had expected or wanted to answer. Not something he'd really wanted to think about, honestly. And something must’ve shown on his face, judging from the frantic look C got._

_“I- No, I just…” With how hesitant they usually were to talk in the first place, Virginis had decided not to push it and make them even more reluctant to bring things up to him. He'd shrugged and let C fall silent as they made their way back to the others._

_It was probably nothing, after all.)_

 

* * *

 

Virginis doesn't like talking to B but he doesn't like talking to himself more, and he’s always been good at taking the easy way out. She still asks him things, anyways, and he still replies, so it's not like things have ever gotten too bad between them. And sure, most of the time it's just for the sake of hearing another voice here in the dark (B is not who he would've picked to be stranded on the brink of nonexistence with, but she's all he's got), and yes he knows he wasn't this harsh with the others but she still tries to talk to him and he still replies and that… He'd like to think that's worth something.

( _Now you know,_ he thinks sometimes, not entirely directed at the planet that's actually in front of him. _Now you know what it's like for no one to care what you say._ ) Besides, B never shouts back at him so she can't be all that upset.

Maybe he’s harsh, but he’s never been a liar, and there’s a difference between the best choice available (talking to her) and the choice he actually wants (talking to--) and it makes him just want to _take it out on something_ because it isn’t _**fair**_.

B always hunches her shoulders when she talks to him now, hands gripped on her elbows and slouched over to protect her chest like it's going to do her any good. They aren't friends, and he's pretty glad of of that for a lot of reasons but mostly because friends can't _make_ friends do anything. (She still looks up to him, after everything he's said, and he sort of feels guilty when the rush of fury fades away. He thinks, in those moments when B is looking anywhere but at him and he doesn't know how he can fix things without looking weak, that maybe he’s fucked this up too.) He’d been friends with the others after all, and when push came to shove came to desertion he couldn't bring himself to grab them by the scruffs of their necks and drag them back for their own good because it'd have burned them to do it. He'd been too stupid to be able to persuade them, too weak to force them, too selfish to do the hard thing and _make them stay even if they hated him for it._

He’s not going to lose B. Not to the void, not to treason, and not to his own pointless sentimentalism.

 

* * *

 

_(D had rolled their eyes and scowled at him when he hadn’t been able to keep a straight face at the sight of B trying to perch on their head like a tame comet, reaching inquisitively for their moons when one floated too close. “If it were physically possible to dump her on you, I would,” they’d huffed irritably at him, because all four of them had done their best to look out for the youngest but Virginis had been the only one who got to be excused from being used as furniture. What with him having fire for skin and all._

_“Come on, D,” he’d said, tilting his head so that his bandanna hopefully hid enough of his face to make his expression look suitably neutral. Judging from D’s deepening glare, it hadn't worked much. “At this rate you’re going to make her wish she was an only child.”)_

 

* * *

 

B wraps her arms around herself (do planets sometimes need to steady themselves the way he does, to focus on keeping a consistent form instead of letting his fire start to blur into the shape of something else? Or do they get cold the way that comets do out there in the void? Virginis doesn’t know, he’s never asked any of them), and she still doesn't quite have the guts to look him in the eyes. She asks why he doesn’t want to think about what’s out there as if _he's_ the one being weird about it.

As if she doesn’t believe him.

 

* * *

 

 _(They hadn’t understood what was out there, they hadn’t known what he knew and they had still refused to_ listen _to him. Sometimes they’d made him so frustrated, so scared and so angry he’d just wanted to reach out and--_

_Why couldn’t they’ve understood he was doing his best to **protect** them?_

_And B had been there, barely, too young and small and squishy-brained to talk, to be left alone at the mercy of everything that he wouldn't be there to warn away if he’d followed to stop them. And the others had fucking _known_ that. Known that he couldn't follow them and let B die._

_It wasn't really her fault, he knew, but as he’d looked at the others disappear into the dark and B had stared up at him with a childish, uncomprehending smile, he’d wished--)_

 

* * *

 

Virginis’ upper rows of teeth, the longer ones, cut into his gums as he lets her know what he thinks, his jaws snapping with too much force.

And B is _still fucking **talking.**_

 

* * *

 

_(A had said, “I know that it's not, that this isn't something you're happy about but… Please, Virginis, try and understand. We need to be our own people. We need to do something. Ourselves.”_

_Virginis had numbly shaken his head, trying to think of an argument they hadn't already disregarded. “Please don't go,” he’d ended up saying, his voice shaking._

_A had drifted closer, C and D whispering a quiet argument behind them. For a moment Virginis had felt something like hope. Maybe they finally understood, maybe they…_

_A had smiled, apologetic but resolute. Something in Virginis froze. “I promise you, Virginis: we'll come back. We'll be alright.”)_

 

* * *

 

He explains. He explains again, and again, and again. He will do this as many times as it takes B to get it through her thick skull that going out there **is not an option.**

And when B’s brows furrow with thought as he turns away, Virginis lets himself hope. Just for a moment. He hopes that she’s going stop it on her own. That he isn't going to have to mourn another planet. That she'll get it and shut up about the void and they can just--

 

~~(“But~~

 

~~_how_ ~~

 

~~did~~

 

~~they~~

 

~~die,~~

 

~~Virginis?”)~~

 

* * *

 

He’s not going to let it go this time.

Virginis clenches his fist, exhales slowly, and turns to look at B. He knows this is going to hurt B more than it's going to hurt him, and what he's going to burn away won't ever grow back. And as B starts to stammer out some excuse and looks desperately like she want to try her luck and run, it'd be a lie to say he doesn't feel like this is just a bit personal. Just a bit like he's doing this for more than the reasons that make it a necessary evil. He considers it for a second, then reaches out to cup his fingers around the back of her head. He ignores the smell of burning meat that makes him one part nauseous (she's his planet and he's _hurting her this is wrong this is bad _why is he doing this this is **wrong, Virginis** ) and two parts hungry. __

The alternatives (the thing in the void with a mouth full of teeth and no tongue, the thing that ate his planets starting with their memories and ending with their hands, the thing with eyes like pits in her face) are still worse than anything he'd do. And as B starts to gasp out apologies, sounding like she's just barely choking down a scream, he considers telling her that.

She'll be alright, he thinks as he waits for her to figure out if she still wants to die out there, or if she wants to stay. (She's still his planet, just as much as the others were.

 

He would never let her die.)

**Author's Note:**

> A, C, and D are all pure speculation on my end: I have no idea what Viginis' other planets were like, what pronouns they used, what their names were, or even how many of them there actually were; I just went from A to D because 59 Virginis is sometimes called _e_ Virginis and I thought that was interesting. (I also have no idea if Black Hole actually had anything to do with their deaths, but it seemed like a safe bet).
> 
> This was not meant to be a defense of Virginis; he is still an asshole, and being in pain doesn't excuse it.


End file.
